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Lesson 27
Genre: Expository Nonfiction
Genre: Poetry
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Focus Skill
Make Inferences
Remember that authors do not always tell readers everything they want them to know about a
topic. When you add what you already know to what an author has told you, you make
inferences.
• First, look for clues in what the author tells you.
• Next, think about what you already know.
• Then, use what the author tells you and what you know to make inferences.
Making inferences can help you better understand the important ideas in a selection.
What the Author Tells Me
What I Already Know
Inference
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Read the article. Then use the chart to make an inference about spiders.
What the Author Tells Me
What I Already Know
Inference
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Vocabulary
Build Robust Vocabulary
prey
shallow
strands
social
spiral
reels
A Florida Wildlife Tour
The scrub lands of Florida are dry. Their climate is perfect for lizards, spiders, gopher tortoises,
and mice. The Florida scrub lizard hunts prey such as ants, beetles, and spiders. Wolf
spiders are hunters, too. They hide in shallow burrows or under dry leaves. Gopher
tortoises eat many kinds of plants. They share long tunnels with other animals.
When the gopher tortoise leaves its tunnel, mice might move in. The mice will line their nests
with strands of Spanish moss.
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You can see social animals such as wood storks or river otters on a visit to one of Florida’s
freshwater swamps. Wood storks live in colonies and wade in the water. River otters are
playful. They rest on the water’s banks and dive in to catch fish.
river otter
Many snakes live in the swamps. The venomous water moccasin hunts rabbits. It curls into a
spiral shape when it rests.
This man reels in a fish.
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Spiders and their Webs
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Introduction
You can find spider webs just about everywhere you look—in forests, deserts, gardens, even
underwater. About 13,000 of the 38,000 known species of spiders make webs to capture
insects and other small prey.
Spider webs are made of silk threads. Young and female spiders are usually the web builders.
Spider silk is liquid when it is inside glands in the spider’s abdomen. It becomes threadlike
as it is drawn out of tiny openings in the spinnerets on the bottom of the spider’s abdomen.
A thread of spider silk is stronger than a thread of steel of the same thickness. Some silk is
stretchy, like a rubber band. Some is sticky. In fact, spiders can make as many as seven
different kinds of silk. Each kind is used for a different purpose, such as making egg cases
or wrapping prey, like the Argiope (far right).
When an insect gets stuck in the threads, the spider attacks. To keep their prey from escaping,
spiders inject venom from their fangs. They may also wrap prey tightly in silk. Most
spiders have teeth to chew an insect’s hard exoskeleton. They spit up juices that turn the
prey’s insides to liquid so they can drink it.
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Spiders deserve our respect. They control insect populations and, in turn, become food for birds
and many other animals. Although most spiders aren’t harmful to us, a few species deliver
a bite that can be painful or even deadly. With spiders, it’s best for their safety and ours to
LOOK BUT DON’T TOUCH.
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Golden Orb Weaver
This huge spider (photograph, right) is a golden orb weaver. That tiny spider with her is her
mate! Her web can be three feet wide or larger. It is strong enough to last for several days.
This spider can choose the color of silk she makes to spin her webs: gold for webs in sunny
places; white for webs in shady places. What looks like drops of water on the web (small
photograph, bottom right) are really glue drops. When an insect, like the bee in the art
above, flies into the web, it gets stuck in a sticky mess. The spider runs out and bites it
with her long fangs. She can eat the insect right away or wrap it in silk and store it in her
web for later.
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Hawaiian Happy-Faced Spider
You have to use a magnifying glass to see this tiny yellow spider with the big grin on her
abdomen. She makes a messy little web in a shallow dip on the underside of a leaf. The
spider uses her web to protect her eggs and to store food. When a small insect visits her
leaf, she springs into action. With her hind legs, she pulls silk from her spinnerets and
tosses it over her prey. Then, she reels it in. After she wraps her meal in silk, she tucks it in
the web next to her eggs. When she gets hungry, she’ll eat it. After her eggs hatch, she’ll
use the web as a nursery and find food for her babies for a few months.
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Water Spider
This kind of spider lives underwater, but it needs air to breathe. To solve this problem, it builds
an air-bubble house. First it attaches strands of silk to the leaves and stems of water plants.
Then it fills the space with a netlike web. The spider makes several trips to the surface.
Each time, a bubble of air sticks to its hairy abdomen. The spider carries the air bubbles
back to its web and brushes them off. The air makes the web swell up like a balloon. The
spider swims outside its house to catch its food, then drags it inside to eat.
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Social Spiders
Some spiders live together in groups. They are called social spiders. Thousands of these spiders
work together to make a web that can be as big as a garbage truck! The web has a sheet of
silk across the bottom. Lots of long lines attach the sheet to the branches of trees and
shrubs, as shown in the art above. These lines “trip” flying insects. They fall down and are
caught in the sheet. The tiny spiders you see in the photograph (left) are busy attacking a
katydid that flew into their web. By working together, social spiders can catch and eat
insects that are many times larger than they are.
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Ray Spider
The ray spider (right) makes an orb web that it uses like a slingshot to snag a meal. With its
front legs, the spider pulls on a silk thread that draws the web back (Step 1). When the
spider senses food is near, it loosens its grip on the thread. The web springs out and catches
the insect in the sticky, spiral threads (Step 2). Then the spider runs across the web and
grabs its prey. Special hairs and claws on the spider’s feet keep it from getting stuck in its
own web. This spider can use its web a few times before it has to build a new one.
Step 1
Step 2
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Cobweb Spider
The spider that made this messy-looking web (photograph, left) is called a cobweb spider. That
red dot in the middle is the spider hanging upside-down. It’s waiting for a meal. It traps
insects with silk threads attached to the lower leaf. They are sticky near the bottom. When
an ant or some other kind of small insect touches one of these threads, it gets stuck. The
line breaks away from the leaf. Like a yo-yo, it springs up, carrying the insect toward the
spider. The spider flings more silk around the insect to make sure it can’t get away. Then
the spider delivers a deadly bite and sucks its prey dry.
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Think Critically
1 How can you tell that many spiders use webs to survive? MAKE INFERENCES
2 What does the water spider do first to build its air-bubble house? SEQUENCE
3 What did you learn about spiders that surprised you? EXPRESS PERSONAL OPINIONS
4 How can you tell that the author wants people to be careful around spiders? DRAW
CONCLUSIONS
5 WR ITE Choose your favorite web from “Spiders and Their Webs.” Use details from the
selection to describe your favorite web to someone who has never seen one. SHORT
RESPONSE
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Meet the Author and Photographer
Darlyne A. Murawski
Darlyne Murawski loves nature and has traveled all over the world taking pictures of small
animals, insects, and marine life. She spent many years studying tropical plants and
butterflies.
Darlyne Murawski says she hopes her books will help children become more interested in
exploring the world of nature. She also writes articles about nature topics for magazines.
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For You
Science
Poetry
“Mama, hey Mama Bug, look overhead!
Why is the sky full of silvery thread”?
“It’s there for whoever—for me and for you;
It’s there for us all, Bugaboo.”
“Mama, hey Mama! Oh, isn’t it grand?
A silvery web waving over the land!”
“It waves at the butterf lies up in the blue,
And also at you, Bugaboo.”
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Boink!
“Mama, that fellow all covered with fuzz—
Why is he winking, the way that he does”?
“For houseflies, and horseflies, and hover flies, too—
And you, Bugaboo. And for you.”
“Mama, he’s rubbing his big fuzzy gut.
Fuzzy looks hungry, but hungry for what”?
“For anyone. Everyone. Who knows who?
For you, Bugaboo. For you.”
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Connections
Comparing Texts
1. How does reading “Spiders and Their Webs” help you understand the poem “For You”?
2. Would you like to be a scientist who studies spiders? Explain your reasons.
3. Why might some people think that spiders are helpful?
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